Address:
Epidemiology and Genomics Research Program
Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences
National Cancer Institute
National Institutes of Health
NCI Riverside 5
8490 Progress Drive, Suite 400
Frederick, MD 21701

Interest Areas

Infectious disease epidemiology

Degrees

B.S. - MicrobiologyUniversity of Maryland, College Park

Biography

Ms. Vaurice Starks is a Program Director in the Environmental Epidemiology Branch (EEB)—formerly the Modifiable Risk Factors Branch (MRFB)—of the Epidemiology and Genomics Research Program (EGRP) in NCI's Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS). She manages a research portfolio on modifiable risk factors with a focus on human papillomavirus (HPV), human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), and other infectious agents that increase cancer risk. Ms. Starks also is the scientific contact for two Program Announcements to encourage research on malignancies in the context of HIV/AIDS and is a member of the internal NCI AIDS Working Group. She also is a member of EGRP's Infectious Agents and Cancer Workgroup, which provides a forum for discussing ideas to advance the understanding of infectious agents and cancer research. Ms. Starks is the co-founder of the Trans-NCI Extramural Awareness Group (TEAG) and is the ad hoc representative for DCCPS. She is a member of a DCCPS subcommittee of NCI's Division of Extramural Activities (DEA) for implementation of enhancements to the NIH peer review process. Ms. Starks also is an NCI mentor.

Prior to joining EGRP in 1999, Ms. Starks worked in the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases' (NIAID) Division of AIDS as a Co-Program Officer of the Multicenter AIDS Cohort Study (MACS) and Women's Interagency HIV Study (WIHS), which are co-funded with NCI. As Co-Program Officer, she was a member of both the MACS and WIHS Executive Committees and served on several working groups. Ms. Starks also worked in NCI's intramural Laboratory of Cellular and Molecular Biology as a Microbiologist and on characterizing the role of erbB-3, a novel epidermal growth factor (EGF) receptor-like transmembrane protein isolated in the laboratory. She used eukaryotic expression vectors transfected into fibroblasts and epithelial cells to study the biological effects of in vitro overexpression of the erbB-3 protein. She constructed chimera molecules of known biological and biochemical properties to determine the functions of individual domains of erbB-3, including tyrosine kinase and ligand-binding domains.